Rules to Eat By

By wang1065 on December 2, 2009 5:29 PM

Rules to
Eat By is a trend feature written
by Michael Pollan for the New York Times. The story talks about the food
issue that people are misguided by the "dazzling food science" conveyed by
marketers, government and experts in the current market.

The feature
applies a traditional structure, arranging
the author's viewpoint into a logical order.

The article can be
divided into two parts. In the first half, Pollan points out that the
so-called "food science," even published bythe nutritionists, is undependable. And the rest suggests that we'd
better rely on the "popular wisdom," which is the way we used before, to choose
food and stay healthy.

I think Pollan organizes
the story pretty well by using the rhetoricquestion andsecond-person writing style.

He raises questions
in the beginning of each part and gives the answer in the followings. This
approach drives the audiences' interests, makes them feel as if they are
pursuing the answer themselves, which is particularly useful when dealing with the
issues in people's daily life

One problem in the
second half of the feature is that it is too abstract for just saying "we
relied on culture" and "ruls of thumb about eating that have been passed down
in our families or plucked from the cultural conversation."

I think that it would
be more convincing for providing specific examples, just as Pollan conducted in
the first half of the story.